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Tue, October 03, 2017

Time, Space, and Revelation

By TruthBook staff

This article from Februray 2016 caught my eye, and I hope it will interest you, too. It's called: Physicists Examine Consciousness & Conclude The Universe Is 'Spiritual, Immaterial & Mental' by Arjun Walia. The Urantia Book helps us to grasp the idea of the universe as mind-made and mind-managed; in fact, The Urantia Book is the only religious bok on the planet that can explain this article adequately. We'll expand on this idea in our blog, below; but first, here are couple of snippets from the article:

"Physicists are being forced to admit that the universe is a "mental" construction. Pioneering physicist Sir James Jeans wrote: 'The stream of knowledge is heading toward a non-mechanical reality; the universe begins to look more like a great thought than like a great machine. Mind no longer appears to be an accidental intruder into the realm of matter, we ought rather hail it as the creator and governor of the realm of matter.' Get over it, and accept the inarguable conclusion. The universe is immaterial-mental and spiritual." ("The Mental Universe" ; Nature 436:29,2005)

and:

"In 1984 a study took place at three different gatherings of over 7000 people who did meditation each morning and evening for three consecutive weeks. The study took place in Fairfield, Iowa (December 17, 1983-January 6, 1984), The Hague, Holland (December 21, 1984-January 13, 1985) and Washington, DC (July 1-July 10, 1985). The results were quite eye-opening. 'Time series' analysis was used in this study to rule out possibilities that the reduction in global terrorism was caused by pre-existing trends, drifts in data or cycles.

"The 7,000 people meditating created a Field Effect of harmonious coherence that spread throughout the collective–which, it is believed, helped to reduce acts of terrorism.

"This effect is called the "Maharishi Effect", and has over 600 scientific studies conducted in 33 countries and in over 250 independent research institutions. The evidence overwhelmingly correlates synchronized group prayer and meditation having social, political and economic benefits to the world. Positive correlations for numerous health benefits to the individual were also observed and confirmed."

The Appeal of The Urantia Book

As a Urantia Book student who has no specialized knowledge of science, I do have quite specific personal knowledge and experience with the reality of God, an experience that anyone can gain if they so desire. The Urantia Book is so special and so accessible for this world in that it draws readers from all walks of life, all educational levels, all ages, all socio-econimic levels, and assists - through revelation - any and all of these reader/students to comprehend the universe, to appreciate the cosmos, and to accept the reality that the universe is one complete WHOLE, of which we are all a part, through the ministry of mind. It is a whole that is a reflection of the wholeness of God - and the circular nature of God.

2:2.1 Even your olden prophets understood the eternal, never-beginning, never-ending, circular nature of the Universal Father. God is literally and eternally present in his universe of universes. He inhabits the present moment with all his absolute majesty and eternal greatness. "The Father has life in himself, and this life is eternal life." Throughout the eternal ages it has been the Father who "gives to all life." There is infinite perfection in the divine integrity. "I am the Lord; I change not." Our knowledge of the universe of universes discloses not only that he is the Father of lights, but also that in his conduct of interplanetary affairs there "is no variableness neither shadow of changing." He "declares the end from the beginning." He says: "My counsel shall stand; I will do all my pleasures" "according to the eternal purpose which I purposed in my Son." Thus are the plans and purposes of the First Source and Center like himself: eternal, perfect, and forever changeless.

If you look over this article above, you'll notice it has quite a bit of pretty technical information regarding quantum physics. I admit this is not my strong suit - maybe it is yours, in which case you will probably glean even more from that information. But the article also explains how what I will call the "collective mind" can influence events.

The power of mind in the prediction of physical phenomena in the universe is spoken of in this article; but also, minds united in prayer can make a difference in the same way. And that is astonishingly good and hopeful news for our world, and is proof that there really is a spiritual component - a minded component - that is in charge of all that we see. But my main takeaway from the article is that, according to scientific discovery, this quote from The Urantia Book is true:

1:6.7 To assume that the universe can be known, that it is intelligible, is to assume that the universe is mind made and personality managed. Man's mind can only perceive the mind phenomena of other minds, be they human or superhuman. If man's personality can experience the universe, there is a divine mind and an actual personality somewhere concealed in that universe.

Science, religion, and revelation

Here are a few other passages from The Urantia Book regarding the relationship between science and religion - a relationship that must be recognized before any coherent understanding of the material universe can be appreciated fully. The importance of recognizing the Universal Father as the unifying factor in all of creation is the key, and the (relatively) small step that has to made, before science and religion can truly be co-ordinated for the benefilt of all.

Revelation - such as that given in The Urantia Book - is how we can sidestep centuries of searching to reach that vital co-ordination NOW.

1:7.5 Ultimate universe reality cannot be grasped by mathematics, logic, or philosophy, only by personal experience in progressive conformity to the divine will of a personal God. Neither science, philosophy, nor theology can validate the personality of God. Only the personal experience of the faith sons of the heavenly Father can effect the actual spiritual realization of the personality of God.

102:3.10 Science seeks to identify, analyze, and classify the segmented parts of the limitless cosmos. Religion grasps the idea-of-the-whole, the entire cosmos. Philosophy attempts the identification of the material segments of science with the spiritual-insight concept of the whole. Wherein philosophy fails in this attempt, revelation succeeds, affirming that the cosmic circle is universal, eternal, absolute, and infinite. This cosmos of the Infinite I AM is therefore endless, limitless, and all-inclusive—timeless, spaceless, and unqualified. And we bear testimony that the Infinite I AM is also the Father of Michael of Nebadon and the God of human salvation.

103:6.2 When man approaches the study and examination of his universe from the outside, he brings into being the various physical sciences; when he approaches the research of himself and the universe from the inside, he gives origin to theology and metaphysics. The later art of philosophy develops in an effort to harmonize the many discrepancies which are destined at first to appear between the findings and teachings of these two diametrically opposite avenues of approaching the universe of things and beings.

103:6.5 A logical and consistent philosophic concept of the universe cannot be built up on the postulations of either materialism or spiritism, for both of these systems of thinking, when universally applied, are compelled to view the cosmos in distortion, the former contacting with a universe turned inside out, the latter realizing the nature of a universe turned outside in. Never, then, can either science or religion, in and of themselves, standing alone, hope to gain an adequate understanding of universal truths and relationships without the guidance of human philosophy and the illumination of divine revelation.

103:7.3 But as ascending man reaches inward and Paradiseward for the God experience, he will likewise be reaching outward and spaceward for an energy understanding of the material cosmos. The progression of science is not limited to the terrestrial life of man; his universe and superuniverse ascension experience will to no small degree be the study of energy transmutation and material metamorphosis. God is spirit, but Deity is unity.

The power of prayer

The article above mentions experiements with prayer and meditation that have proved to be beneficial. Any Urantia Book student knows how important prayer and meditation are; Jesus himeslf was a regular prayer - a regular meditator. Prayer is truly powerful:

144:4.9 Prayer is the sincere and longing look of the child to its spirit Father; it is a psychologic process of exchanging the human will for the divine will. Prayer is a part of the divine plan for making over that which is into that which ought to be.

146:2.7 When you have become wholly dedicated to the doing of the will of the Father in heaven, the answer to all your petitions will be forthcoming because your prayers will be in full accordance with the Father's will, and the Father's will is ever manifest throughout his vast universe. What the true son desires and the infinite Father wills IS. Such a prayer cannot remain unanswered, and no other sort of petition can possibly be fully answered.

Said Jesus: 144:2.2 "Prayer is entirely a personal and spontaneous expression of the attitude of the soul toward the spirit; prayer should be the communion of sonship and the expression of fellowship. Prayer, when indited by the spirit, leads to co-operative spiritual progress. The ideal prayer is a form of spiritual communion which leads to intelligent worship. True praying is the sincere attitude of reaching heavenward for the attainment of your ideals."

180:2.4 How long will it take the world of believers to understand that prayer is not a process of getting your way but rather a program of taking God's way, an experience of learning how to recognize and execute the Father's will? It is entirely true that, when your will has been truly aligned with his, you can ask anything conceived by that will-union, and it will be granted. And such a will-union is effected by and through Jesus even as the life of the vine flows into and through the living branches.

Hence, the proven success of prayer when used for the betterment of civilization.

As regards time:

The article above states: "Time as we measure it and know it, doesn't really exist."

Ftrom The Urantia Book:

189:1.3 Mankind is slow to perceive that, in all that is personal, matter is the skeleton of morontia, and that both are the reflected shadow of enduring spirit reality. How long before you will regard time as the moving image of eternity and space as the fleeting shadow of Paradise realities?

118:1.1 It is helpful to man's cosmic orientation to attain all possible comprehension of Deity's relation to the cosmos. While absolute Deity is eternal in nature, the Gods are related to time as an experience in eternity. In the evolutionary universes eternity is temporal everlastingness—the everlasting now.

Said Jesus:

103:7.5 Animals do not sense time as does man, and even to man, because of his sectional and circumscribed view, time appears as a succession of events; but as man ascends, as he progresses inward, the enlarging view of this event procession is such that it is discerned more and more in its wholeness. That which formerly appeared as a succession of events then will be viewed as a whole and perfectly related cycle; in this way will circular simultaneity increasingly displace the onetime consciousness of the linear sequence of events. Time, space, and experience are man's greatest aids to relative reality perception and yet his most formidable obstacles to complete reality perception. Mortals and many other universe creatures find it necessary to think of potentials as being actualized in space and evolving to fruition in time, but this entire process is a time-space phenomenon which does not actually take place on Paradise and in eternity. On the absolute level there is neither time nor space; all potentials may be there perceived as actuals.

12:5.2 Space is not infinite, even though it takes origin from Paradise; not absolute, for it is pervaded by the Unqualified Absolute. We do not know the absolute limits of space, but we do know that the absolute of time is eternity.

See our topical on Time and Space here for many more Urantia Book teachings about time and space

This world and our sojourn here is a "test of time" that has a beginning and an end

Consider: once we reach the realm of the Central Universe:

26:9.3 The test of time is almost over; the race for eternity has been all but run. The days of uncertainty are ending; the temptation to doubt is vanishing; the injunction to be perfect has been obeyed. From the very bottom of intelligent existence the creature of time and material personality has ascended the evolutionary spheres of space, thus proving the feasibility of the ascension plan while forever demonstrating the justice and righteousness of the command of the Universal Father to his lowly creatures of the worlds: "Be you perfect, even as I am perfect."

Step by step, life by life, world by world, the ascendant career has been mastered, and the goal of Deity has been attained. Survival is complete in perfection, and perfection is replete in the supremacy of divinity. Time is lost in eternity; space is swallowed up in worshipful identity and harmony with the Universal Father. The broadcasts of Havona flash forth the space reports of glory, the good news that in very truth the conscientious creatures of animal nature and material origin have, through evolutionary ascension, become in reality and eternally the perfected sons of God.

1:7.7 ...neither space nor time can be absolute or infinite. The First Source and Center is that infinity who unqualifiedly transcends all mind, all matter, and all spirit.

In other words, time truly is an artificial construct, as we are taught in The Urantia Book...necessary for our growth in the evolutionary universes, but ultimately, non-existent in eternity. And when you really think about it, the individual who has discovered the connection between God, themselves, and the cosmos is an individual who knows that time can be transcended, even while here on earth, because the spirit-conscious person lives in eternity NOW.

Finally:

32:5.1 There is a great and glorious purpose in the march of the universes through space. All of your mortal struggling is not in vain. We are all part of an immense plan, a gigantic enterprise, and it is the vastness of the undertaking that renders it impossible to see very much of it at any one time and during any one life. We are all a part of an eternal project which the Gods are supervising and outworking. The whole marvelous and universal mechanism moves on majestically through space to the music of the meter of the infinite thought and the eternal purpose of the First Great Source and Center.

As regards an individual life, the duration of a realm, or the chronology of any connected series of events, it would seem that we are dealing with an isolated stretch of time; everything seems to have a beginning and an end. And it would appear that a series of such experiences, lives, ages, or epochs, when successively arranged, constitutes a straightaway drive, an isolated event of time flashing momentarily across the infinite face of eternity. But when we look at all this from behind the scenes, a more comprehensive view and a more complete understanding suggest that such an explanation is inadequate, disconnected, and wholly unsuited properly to account for, and otherwise to correlate, the transactions of time with the underlying purposes and basic reactions of eternity.

And all of this, dear reader, is to encourage you to accept the challenge to open and expand your mind through the study of The Urantia Book. We frequently publish blogs that have to do with Jesus and his matchless life and teachings; but there is also in The Urantia Book a view of reality that can enormously help each one of us to really grasp the meanings and values behind all that we see around us - on earth and in the heavens. And once we get this glimpse into the mind of God and his divine purposes - once we understand and accept the Fatherhood of this same God and our sonship with him, we can only become happier, more productive citizens of the world as well as eternal citizens of the cosmos.

Wed, May 03, 2017

Birds and Dinosaurs in The Urantia Book

By Truthbook Staff

Here's an article that appears to be a scientific corroboration of some Urantia Book teachings about bird evolution, along with the decline and extiinction of dinosaurs: New indications of gradual decline of dinosaurs before the end of the cretaceous period by paleontology researchers at Heidelberg University. We supply those teachings below in our blog, but here's the snippet that caught my eye:

"While conducting paleontological research in northeastern Mexico, the scientists came upon sedimentary rock deposited toward the end of the Cretaceous Period that evidenced an enormous diversity of fossils, including the tracks of birds, dinosaurs and pterosaurs. "Most of the imprints come from at least five different species of birds; dinosaur tracks, however, are rare. Only a single footprint comes from a predatory dinosaur," explains Prof. Stinnesbeck. The finds therefore indicate a gradual decline of the dinosaurs with a simultaneous increase in the diversity of birds even before the end of the Cretaceous Period' Until now, it was generally assumed that the dinosaurs died out first and bird species diversified afterward,' states the researcher. 'Our data, however, substantiate the theory that birds ascended before dinosaurs became extinct.' "

One thing that many readers appreciate about the teachings of The Urantia Book is that they introduce and educate even the average reader about the facts of momentous and important events in the history of our world - its development along with the development and evolution of species. It's a huge panorama, and accessible to even the casual reader of the revelation. Following are some of the book's information about dinosaurs and birds:

Dinosaurs - Monarchs of an Age

140,000,000 years ago, suddenly and with only the hint of the two prereptilian ancestors that developed in Africa during the preceding epoch, the reptiles appeared in full-fledged form. They developed rapidly, soon yielding crocodiles, scaled reptiles, and eventually both sea serpents and flying reptiles. Their transition ancestors speedily disappeared.

These rapidly evolving reptilian dinosaurs soon became the monarchs of this age. They were egg layers and are distinguished from all animals by their small brains, having brains weighing less than one pound to control bodies later weighing as much as forty tons. But earlier reptiles were smaller, carnivorous, and walked kangaroolike on their hind legs. They had hollow avian bones and subsequently developed only three toes on their hind feet, and many of their fossil footprints have been mistaken for those of giant birds. Later on, the herbivorous dinosaurs evolved. They walked on all fours, and one branch of this group developed a protective armor.

How these Monarchs Became Extinct

For many years, science has theorized that the dinosaurs perished all at once, due to a collision of an asteriod with the planet; the article also mentions the asteroid event, and still maintains that it was responsible for a "mass extinction" in the Cretaceous period, but not for the extinction of dinosaurs But Urantia Book teachings further correct this error. They corroborate the findings in the article above in that they show that the dinosaur decline was a gradual development, not connected to an asteroid collision. Further, Urantia Book teachings do not speak of any mass extictions in this period:

Soon after two species of dinosaurs migrated to the water in a futile attempt at self-preservation, two other types were driven to the air by the bitter competition of life on land. But these flying pterosaurs were not the ancestors of the true birds of subsequent ages. They evolved from the hollow-boned leaping dinosaurs, and their wings were of batlike formation with a spread of twenty to twenty-five feet. These ancient flying reptiles grew to be ten feet long, and they had separable jaws much like those of modern snakes. For a time these flying reptiles appeared to be a success, but they failed to evolve along lines which would enable them to survive as air navigators. They represent the nonsurviving strains of bird ancestry.

One hundred million years ago the reptilian age was drawing to a close. The dinosaurs, for all their enormous mass, were all but brainless animals, lacking the intelligence to provide sufficient food to nourish such enormous bodies. And so did these sluggish land reptiles perish in ever-increasing numbers. Henceforth, evolution will follow the growth of brains, not physical bulk, and the development of brains will characterize each succeeding epoch of animal evolution and planetary progress.

This period, embracing the height and the beginning decline of the reptiles, extended nearly twenty-five million years and is known as the Jurassic.

Throughout these parts of The Urantia Book, the authors speak of "sudden" developments in evolution - the sudden appearance of a species. And birds are one of those sudden developments; however, this development did occur concomitantly with the decline of the dinosaurs, as the article above indicates.

58:6.3 From era to era radically new species of animal life arise. They do not evolve as the result of the gradual accumulation of small variations; they appear as full-fledged and new orders of life, and they appear suddenly.

The sudden appearance of new species and diversified orders of living organisms is wholly biologic, strictly natural. There is nothing supernatural connected with these genetic mutations.

The Sudden Emergence of Birds

60,000,000 years ago, though the land reptiles were on the decline, the dinosaurs continued as monarchs of the land, the lead now being taken by the more agile and active types of the smaller leaping kangaroo varieties of the carnivorous dinosaurs. But sometime previously there had appeared new types of the herbivorous dinosaurs, whose rapid increase was due to the appearance of the grass family of land plants. One of these new grass-eating dinosaurs was a true quadruped having two horns and a capelike shoulder flange. The land type of turtle, twenty feet across, appeared as did also the modern crocodile and true snakes of the modern type. Great changes were also occurring among the fishes and other forms of marine life.

The wading and swimming prebirds of earlier ages had not been a success in the air, nor had the flying dinosaurs. They were a short-lived species, soon becoming extinct. They, too, were subject to the dinosaur doom, destruction, because of having too little brain substance in comparison with body size. This second attempt to produce animals that could navigate the atmosphere failed, as did the abortive attempt to produce mammals during this and a preceding age.

55,000,000 years ago the evolutionary march was marked by the sudden appearance of the first of the true birds, a small pigeonlike creature which was the ancestor of all bird life. This was the third type of flying creature to appear on earth, and it sprang directly from the reptilian group, not from the contemporary flying dinosaurs nor from the earlier types of toothed land birds. And so this becomes known as the age of birds as well as the declining age of reptiles.

Ammonites

The article above also mentions ammonites, a common (and very beautiful) fossil that one sees in rock shops all over the world. Ammonites were around for tens of thousands of years before this era, when they declined, along with the dinosaurs. The age of their greatest presence was known as the Triassic Age

60:1.12 The marine life of this period was meager but improved rapidly with the new invasion of the sea, which again produced extensive coast lines of shallow waters. Since there was more shallow water around Europe and Asia, the richest fossil beds are to be found about these continents. Today, if you would study the life of this age, examine the Himalayan, Siberian and Mediterranean regions, as well as India and the islands of the southern Pacific basin. A prominent feature of the marine life was the presence of hosts of the beautiful ammonites, whose fossil remains are found all over the world.

130,000,000 years ago the seas had changed very little. Siberia and North America were connected by the Bering Strait land bridge. A rich and unique marine life appeared on the Californian Pacific coast, where over one thousand species of ammonites developed from the higher types of Cephalopods. The life changes of this period were indeed revolutionary notwithstanding that they were transitional and gradual.

Biologically as well as geologically this was an eventful and active age on land and under water. Sea urchins increased while corals and crinoids decreased. The ammonites, of preponderant influence during a previous age, also rapidly declined. On land the fern forests were largely replaced by pine and other modern trees, including the gigantic redwoods. By the end of this period, while the placental mammal has not yet evolved, the biologic stage is fully set for the appearance, in a subsequent age, of the early ancestors of the future mammalian types.

You can read much more about these developments in our planet's history by visiting these links, from which most of the passages above were taken:

Far from being an exclusively religious text, The Urantia Book supplies the student with an enormous amount of easily-digestible information about the physical and earth sciences: Astronomy, archaeology, geology, and in this case, paleontology. Its teachings also demonstrate the importance of evolution as the driving force behind these early developments; developments that eventually led to the appearance of mammals and man himself as the crown of creation. This kind of information is vital to our balanced understanding of the planet we live on (called Urantia), and our eventual destiny - as a world and as individual citizens in an ordered, friendly universe family of worlds and personalities.

Thu, February 23, 2017

Our Home Sweet Home

1. Urantia is the sentimental shrine of all Nebadon.

2. It is the chief of ten million inhabited worlds.

3. It is the mortal home Jesus of Nazareth, known in the universe as: Christ Michael, sovereign of all Nebadon, a Son of Man in the likeness of mortal flesh, and the Planetary Prince of Urantia.

119:8.8 Urantia is the sentimental shrine of all Nebadon, the chief of ten million inhabited worlds, the mortal home of Christ Michael, sovereign of all Nebadon, a Melchizedek minister to the realms, a system savior, an Adamic redeemer, a seraphic fellow, an associate of ascending spirits, a morontia progressor, a Son of Man in the likeness of mortal flesh, and the Planetary Prince of Urantia. And your record tells the truth when it says that this same Jesus has promised sometime to return to the world of his terminal bestowal, the World of the Cross.

4. Urantia is the home of a divisional headquarters of the archangels.

37:3.3 The archangel corps of Nebadon is directed by the first-born of this order, and in more recent times a divisional headquarters of the archangels has been maintained on Urantia. It is this unusual fact that soon arrests the attention of extra-Nebadon student visitors. Among their early observations of intrauniverse transactions is the discovery that many ascendant activities of the Brilliant Evening Stars are directed from the capital of a local system, Satania. On further examination they discover that certain archangel activities are directed from a small and apparently insignificant inhabited world called Urantia. And then ensues the revelation of Michael's bestowal on Urantia and their immediately quickened interest in you and your lowly sphere.

5. Urantia is a decimal planet, a life-experiment world.

36:2.15 The planetary life-planning laboratories are situated on the second satellite of this world number two. In these laboratories the Life Carriers and all their associates collaborate with the Melchizedeks in the effort to modify and possibly improve the life designed for implantation on the decimal planets of Nebadon. The life now evolving on Urantia was planned and partially worked out on this very world, for Urantia is a decimal planet, a life-experiment world. On one world in each ten a greater variance in the standard life designs is permitted than on the other (nonexperimental) worlds.

6. Urantia is one of the isolated worlds of Norlatiadek, and a Vorondadek observer has been stationed on the planet ever since the Caligastia betrayal.

43:5.17 Every quarantined or isolated world has a Vorondadek Son acting as an observer. He does not participate in planetary administration except when ordered by the Constellation Father to intervene in the affairs of the nations. Actually it is this Most High observer who "rules in the kingdoms of men." Urantia is one of the isolated worlds of Norlatiadek, and a Vorondadek observer has been stationed on the planet ever since the Caligastia betrayal. When Machiventa Melchizedek ministered in semimaterial form on Urantia, he paid respectful homage to the Most High observer then on duty, as it is written, "And Melchizedek, king of Salem, was the priest of the Most High." Melchizedek revealed the relations of this Most High observer to Abraham when he said, "And blessed be the Most High, who has delivered your enemies into your hand."

7. Urantia is in the lines of tremendous energies, a small planet in the circuit of enormous masses.

41:2.8 Urantia is in the lines of tremendous energies, a small planet in the circuit of enormous masses, and the local controllers sometimes employ enormous numbers of their order in an effort to equalize these lines of energy. They do fairly well with regard to the physical circuits of Satania but have trouble insulating against the powerful Norlatiadek currents.

8. While Urantia is, at present, outside the spiritual circuits of Satania and Norlatiadek, you are otherwise in intimate touch with interplanetary affairs, for these messengers from Jerusem frequently come to this world as to all the other spheres of the system.

39:5.17The Reserves. The Satania reserve corps of the planetary seraphim is maintained on Jerusem in close association with the reserves of the Material Sons. These abundant reserves repletely provide for every phase of the manifold activities of this seraphic order. These angels are also the personal message bearers of the local systems. They serve transition mortals, angels, and the Material Sons as well as others domiciled on the system headquarters. While Urantia is, at present, outside the spiritual circuits of Satania and Norlatiadek, you are otherwise in intimate touch with interplanetary affairs, for these messengers from Jerusem frequently come to this world as to all the other spheres of the system.

9. Seldom does a day pass in which a transport seraphim of Satania does not deposit some student visitor or some other traveler of spirit or semispirit nature on the shores of Urantia.

39:4.15The Transporters. These are the transport seraphim who function in the local systems. In Satania, your system, they carry passengers back and forth from Jerusem and otherwise serve as interplanetary transporters. Seldom does a day pass in which a transport seraphim of Satania does not deposit some student visitor or some other traveler of spirit or semispirit nature on the shores of Urantia. These very space traversers will sometime carry you to and from the various worlds of the system headquarters group, and when you have finished the Jerusem assignment, they will carry you forward to Edentia. But under no circumstances will they carry you backward to the world of human origin. A mortal never returns to his native planet during the dispensation of his temporal existence, and if he should return during a subsequent dispensation, he would be escorted by a transport seraphim of the universe headquarters group.

10. Each administrative day on Urantia begins with a consultative conference, which is attended by administrative representatives of our planetary government.

114:5.5 Each administrative day on Urantia begins with a consultative conference, which is attended by the governor general, the planetary chief of archangels, the Most High observer, the supervising supernaphim, the chief of resident Life Carriers, and invited guests from among the high Sons of the universe or from among certain of the student visitors who may chance to be sojourning on the planet.

11. Urantia is commonly referred to as 606 of Satania in Norlatiadek of Nebadon, meaning the six hundred sixth inhabited world in the local system of Satania, situated in the constellation of Norlatiadek, one of the one hundred constellations of the local universe of Nebadon.

43:0.1 Urantia is commonly referred to as 606 of Satania in Norlatiadek of Nebadon, meaning the six hundred sixth inhabited world in the local system of Satania, situated in the constellation of Norlatiadek, one of the one hundred constellations of the local universe of Nebadon. Constellations being the primary divisions of a local universe, their rulers link the local systems of inhabited worlds to the central administration of the local universe on Salvington and by reflectivity to the superadministration of the Ancients of Days on Uversa.

We are so LOVED, never forget:

Your planet is a member of an enormous cosmos; you belong to a well-nigh infinite family of worlds, but your sphere is just as precisely administered and just as lovingly fostered as if it were the only inhabited world in all existence. (A Universal Censor hailing from Uversa, 15.14.9)

Wed, February 22, 2017

Seven Earth-Size Planets Found!

By TruthBook Staff

Folks, here's another exciting discovery from the world of astronomy, and the search for life in the universes: 7 Earth-Size Planets Identified in Orbit Around a Dwarf Star by Kenneth Chang. The Urantia Book teaches us that moons such as these newly discovered spheres are often ideal candidates for mortal habitation:

"Many of these enormous spheres have satellites, sometimes a half dozen or more, and these moons are often in size very near that of Urantia, so that they are almost ideal for habitation." (See more below, in our blog)

This blockbuster news from NASA leaves us beyond excited! Here's a snippet from the article:

"Not just one, but seven Earth-size planets that could potentially harbor life have been identified orbiting a tiny star not too far away, offering the first realistic opportunity to search for signs of alien life outside of the solar system.

"The planets orbit a dwarf star named Trappist-1, about 40 light-years, or 235 trillion miles, from Earth. That is quite close in cosmic terms, and by happy accident, the orientation of the orbits of the seven planets allows them to be studied in great detail.

"One or more of the exoplanets in this new system could be at the right temperature to be awash in oceans of water, astronomers said, based on the distance of the planets from the dwarf star.

“ 'This is the first time so many planets of this kind are found around the same star,' ” Michael Gillon, an astronomer at the University of Liege in Belgium and the leader of an international team that has been observing Trappist-1, said during a telephone news conference organized by the journal Nature, which published the findings on Wednesday."

Thanks to The Urantia Book, we do know that we are definitely not alone in the universe, and it is very heartening to know that modern science is once again corroborating and validating the teachings of The Urantia Book, which presented these ideas to us long before the advent of the "space age."

What else does The Urantia Book say about moons like those in the article?

49:0.4 Not all planets are suited to harbor mortal life. Small ones having a high rate of axial revolution are wholly unsuited for life habitats. In several of the physical systems of Satania the planets revolving around the central sun are too large for habitation, their great mass occasioning oppressive gravity. Many of these enormous spheres have satellites, sometimes a half dozen or more, and these moons are often in size very near that of Urantia, so that they are almost ideal for habitation.

The oldest inhabited world of Satania, world number one, is Anova, one of the forty-four satellites revolving around an enormous dark planet but exposed to the differential light of three neighboring suns. Anova is in an advanced stage of progressive civilization.

But, why do we feel so alone?

But, why do we feel so alone here? We look into the skies, and we send our ships and our telescopes out into the void, searching for others like us...why is it such a struggle? The Urantia Book teaches:

50:6.5 You should not forget that for two hundred thousand years all the worlds of Satania have rested under the spiritual ban of Norlatiadek in consequence of the Lucifer rebellion. And it will require age upon age to retrieve the resultant handicaps of sin and secession. Your world still continues to pursue an irregular and checkered career as a result of the double tragedy of a rebellious Planetary Prince and a defaulting Material Son. Even the bestowal of Christ Michael on Urantia did not immediately set aside the temporal consequences of these serious blunders in the earlier administration of the world.

Please click on the underlined links to read more of the story...

Oftentimes, humans can feel isolated, maybe even forgotten. We are so far on the fringes of the universe...but this Urantia Book passage assures us:

114:7.17 Your isolated world is not forgotten in the counsels of the universe. Urantia is not a cosmic orphan stigmatized by sin and shut away from divine watchcare by rebellion. From Uversa to Salvington and on down to Jerusem, even in Havona and on Paradise, they all know we are here; and you mortals now dwelling on Urantia are just as lovingly cherished and just as faithfully watched over as if the sphere had never been betrayed by a faithless Planetary Prince, even more so. It is eternally true, "the Father himself loves you."

As a final note, we want to call your attention to the fact that spheres like those discovered in the article might also be candidates for a "relocation" scenario, should the unthinkable happen, and our planet earth has to be evacuated. In our "As Seen on TV" article titled The Explosion of the Sun and the Annihilation of Life, we explore this possbility:

Mon, January 30, 2017

The Ruins of Bethsaida

By TruthBook Staff

Bethsaida was an important place for Jesus; he trained evangelists, established a hospital, healed the paralytic, and headquartered there with the apostles. In this Smithsonian article: Unearthing the World of Jesus by Ariel Sabar, Special attention is given to new discoveries of this key city in the Master's life. See our blog below, but first, here's a snip about findings at Bethsaida from the article:

"The ruins of Bethsaida lie atop an oval-shaped, 20-acre mound of volcanic earth. Flowing all around are the hills of the Golan, which plunge through stands of eucalyptus and across plains of mango and palm groves to the Sea of Galilee."

What does The Urantia Book teach about Jesus and his connection to Bethsaida?

When Jesus was 27 years-old he first met Zebedee, a friend of Jesus' earth father Joseph. Zebedee lived in Bethsaida and worked as a boatbuilder; Jesus lived and worked there with Zebedee and his family for a year before embarking on his tour of the Mediterranean world with the Indian travelers.

Later, following the choosing of the first six apostles, Bethsaida became the headquarters for Jesus and the apostolic party, which was established in the home of Zebedee and Salome, the parents of apostles James and John Zebedee. And this headquarters was to be "home base" for Jesus and the twelve for nearly three years, so they came in and out of Bethsaida frequently.

138:5.4 Zebedee and Salome had gone to live with their son David so that their large home [in Bethsaida] could be turned over to Jesus and his twelve apostles. Here Jesus spent a quiet Sabbath with his chosen messengers; he carefully outlined the plans for proclaiming the kingdom and fully explained the importance of avoiding any clash with the civil authorities

Additionally, there is an entire Paper devoted to Jesus and the apostles' activities in Bethsaida. Among them are these notable events:

And there are many other references for Bethsaida in The Urantia Book. Use our convenient Search feature at the top right of any TruthBook page to see how many there are! Just enter the word Bethsaida in the box marked "Search The Urantia Book only."

These excavations in the area of the Sea of Galilee are exciting to watch. Once again, we are delighted to see that modern science is discovering the places that Jesus lived and worked - places that are so familiar to Urantia Book readers!

4. Help someone – be selfless

5. Master yourself in small and large ways; use spiritual power to overcome!

Said Jesus: " 'Verily, verily, I say to you, he who rules his own self is greater than he who captures a city. Click here to read more...

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Tips and teachings from The Urantia Book

1. Believe in God's promises and follow his instructions

What are God's promises? One of the most sweeping and most comforting of God's promises is what The Urantia Book calls "The Great Urantian Agreement;" this agreement was struck between Melchizedek and Abraham during Melchizedelk's incarnation here on earth. It reads:

"This covenant of Melchizedek with Abraham represents the great Urantian agreement between divinity and humanity whereby God agrees to do everything; man only agrees to believe God's promises and follow his instructions. Heretofore it had been believed that salvation could be secured only by works—sacrifices and offerings; now, Melchizedek again brought to Urantia the good news that salvation, favor with God, is to be had by faith."

Want more? Instruction and promise doesn't get much plainer than this:

"Happy are the poor in spirit, the humble, for theirs are the treasures of the kingdom of heaven.

"Happy are they who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled.

"Happy are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.

"Happy are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.

"Happy are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.

"Happy are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the sons of God.

"Without a worthy goal, life becomes aimless and unprofitable, and much unhappiness results. Jesus' discourse at the ordination of the twelve constitutes a master philosophy of life. Jesus exhorted his followers to exercise experiential faith. He admonished them not to depend on mere intellectual assent, credulity, and established authority."

Don't be too busy. Many believers find that these worshipful and mindful practices actually help them save time throughout a day.

"Religious habits of thinking and acting are contributory to the economy of spiritual growth. One can develop religious predispositions toward favorable reaction to spiritual stimuli, a sort of conditioned spiritual reflex. Habits which favor religious growth embrace cultivated sensitivity to divine values, recognition of religious living in others, reflective meditation on cosmic meanings, worshipful problem solving, sharing one's spiritual life with one's fellows, avoidance of selfishness, refusal to presume on divine mercy, living as in the presence of God. The factors of religious growth may be intentional, but the growth itself is unvaryingly unconscious."

"The more healthful attitude of spiritual meditation is to be found in reflective worship and in the prayer of thanksgiving."

3. Read the Urantia Book

Reading The Urantia Book is not only a great way to get in touch with God, but to relax and take time for yourself as well. Instead of spending your Monday evening watching reality TV reruns, reread your favorite stories and teachings in The Urantia Book … or find new ones to help you get motivated for the New Year. There is definitely an amazing Urantia Book passage just waiting to become your mantra for living better in 2017!

4. Help someone – be selfless

There is always someone in more trouble than you, help them and your problems will melt away.

"All of this magnificent creation, including yourself, was not made just for you. This is not an egocentric universe. The Gods have decreed, 'It is more blessed to give than to receive,' and said your Master Son, 'He who would be greatest among you let him be server of all.'"

"Service—purposeful service, not slavery—is productive of the highest satisfaction and is expressive of the divinest dignity. Service—more service, increased service, difficult service, adventurous service, and at last divine and perfect service—is the goal of time and the destination of space. But ever will the play cycles of time alternate with the service cycles of progress. And after the service of time there follows the superservice of eternity. During the play of time you should envision the work of eternity, even as you will, during the service of eternity, reminisce the play of time."

5. Master yourself in small and large ways; use spiritual power to overcome!

Said Jesus: " 'Verily, verily, I say to you, he who rules his own self is greater than he who captures a city. Self-mastery is the measure of man's moral nature and the indicator of his spiritual development. In the old order you fasted and prayed; as the new creature of the rebirth of the spirit, you are taught to believe and rejoice. In the Father's kingdom you are to become new creatures; old things are to pass away; behold I show you how all things are to become new. And by your love for one another you are to convince the world that you have passed from bondage to liberty, from death into life everlasting.'"

" 'By the old way you seek to suppress, obey, and conform to the rules of living; by the new way you are first transformed by the Spirit of Truth and thereby strengthened in your inner soul by the constant spiritual renewing of your mind, and so are you endowed with the power of the certain and joyous performance of the gracious, acceptable, and perfect will of God. Forget not—it is your personal faith in the exceedingly great and precious promises of God that ensures your becoming partakers of the divine nature. Thus by your faith and the spirit's transformation, you become in reality the temples of God, and his spirit actually dwells within you. If, then, the spirit dwells within you, you are no longer bondslaves of the flesh but free and liberated sons of the spirit. The new law of the spirit endows you with the liberty of self-mastery in place of the old law of the fear of self-bondage and the slavery of self-denial.' "

HAPPY NEW YEAR! May 2018 become THE year that you make new spiritual progress!

Mon, January 09, 2017

As Seen on TV: The Search for Extraterrestrial Life

By TruthBook Staff

Presently there are a number of long running television series proposing that extraterrestrial life may exist; if it does, there are scientists, artists, and futurists around the globe who desire to make contact with it. Two of the prominent research organizations engaged in this quest are SETI [the Search for extraterrestrial Intelligence] and IETI [an Invitation to Extraterrestrial Intelligence].

The Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence [SETI] is an exploratory scientific organization that seeks evidence of life in the universe by looking for some signature of its technology using radio telescopes and other astronomical monitoring equipment. The SETI Institute is a private, nonprofit organization dedicated to scientific research, education, and public outreach. Located in Mountain View, CA. research is conducted in three centers: the Carl Sagan Center for the Study of Life in the Universe, the Center for Education, and the Center for Public Outreach. SETI has a passion for discovery, and for sharing knowledge as scientific ambassadors to the public, the press, and the government. Today SETI employs over 130 scientists and support staff.

The second organization is Invitation to Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence [IETI], which has issued an invitation through the internet to any extraterrestrial Intelligence having the capability to read it in hopes of establishing a constructive dialog between humanity and our cosmic companions. The individuals issuing this invitation to make ET’s acquaintance appear to be reputable scientists and noteworthy individuals; they appear to be sincere, intelligent people in the quest for concrete affirmation that we are not alone in the universe.

The intent of this article is to alert truth seekers that there is already evidence that extraterrestrials exist and the questions these and other organizations are seeking answers to have been addressed and specifically answered through the teachings in one monumental book first published in 1955, The Urantia Book, which provides plausible explanation to assure us that we are not alone in the universe and that it is friendly, that life on other planets does exist, and that our destiny is glorious. The Urantia Book provides reasonable teachings regarding past, present and future contact with extraterrestrials.

Our earth has been visited, and is still constantly being visited, by beings that are not of this world. The universes teem with personalities and there are countless inhabited planets out there. [Reference links to the text are provided throughout this article.]

What is Intelligence?

According to the SETI site Legg and Hutter define universal intelligence as the time discounted reward (value) obtained by a unit (agent) over the set of computable reward summable environments, weighted by the simplicity (inverse exponentiated Kolmogorov complexity) of the environment. It is recognized by learning to learn, speed of adaptation, discovering low­dimensional compressed structures and regularities, allowing manipulation and prediction of the environment, representing the world internally as a model and using this to plan.

The Urantia Book defines intelligent life as: “Life is really a process which takes place between the organism (selfhood) and its environment. The personality imparts value of identity and meanings of continuity to this organismal-environmental association. Thus it will be recognized that the phenomenon of stimulus-response is not a mere mechanical process since the personality functions as a factor in the total situation. It is ever true that mechanisms are innately passive; organisms, inherently active.”

Communicating With ET

Listed on the IETI website are the following ten questions for extraterrestrials to reply to:

1. Tell us about yourself. We are interested in many details, including what star or planet you originally came from, how and when you (or your predecessors) traveled here, your mission or purposes, your individual history or background, your physical form, and your relationship to your home civilization.

2. We wish to learn about the culture or civilization from which you have come, or the group or species of which you are a member. Please tell us about its key characteristics:

3. Who else lives in our galaxy and beyond? What sorts of interaction do they have with one another? What sorts of joint ventures are they engaged in? In what ways are we similar to others in our galaxy, and different from them? What is humanity’s place in the galactic community and in the cosmos?

4. What else should we do to achieve contact with other forms of extraterrestrial intelligence? Have any other forms of ETI visited our solar system in recent years? Does any dangerous or hostile form of ETI pose any threat to us?

5. Toward what long-term future or ultimate destination is the universe heading? Why do life and the universe exist; what is the point of it all? How can we best find meaning and purpose in the universe? What is your understanding of any genuine religious, spiritual, transpersonal, and psychic aspects of reality? What still baffles or puzzles you about the universe?

6. What is your assessment of us? How well are we doing at day-to-day effectiveness, governance, fairness, truth-telling, caring, and harmony? At ensuring our long-term flourishing? At discovering and synthesizing knowledge that is deeply important?

7. If humans achieved their maximum positive potential what could we become?

8. What path can lead human society to achieve its potential? In other words, how can human civilization move toward a positive long-term future? As part of this, how can we eliminate warfare, weapons, and violence?

9. What can individual human beings contribute to the universe? What is your advice on the purposes, passions, meaning, love, and learning that should be at the core of individual human lives?

10. What additional knowledge about us would you like? What baffles or puzzles you about us? What other sorts of things would you like from us? What can we contribute to you that would be of value to you?

A Flaw in the Basic Scientific Presumption

As you might see from the above questions, IETI is looking for this contact to occur with physical beings at some future time. In our view, it is questionable whether there will ever be other real extraterrestrial contact like what is being anticipated; but the actual contact and the answers to these and many other significant questions can be studied and evaluated right here and now; it could take a millennium or more for us to assimilate and to put into practice what the ET authors of The Urantia Book have already bestowed.

If The Urantia Book is factual, then why would intelligent beings continue to impart what was previously conferred? Before we are ready for further contact it may be up to us earthlings to uplift our thoughts and our diverse cultures by discovering the message, understanding it, and incorporating its teachings into our science, religion and philosophy.

While science is compelled to search for all of its answers in the material creation many answers can only come from the spirit counterpart.

Although religion and spirituality are mentioned by IETI, the scientific search is focused on contact from physical beings like us. The extraterrestrial contact we’ve received through The Urantia Book wasn’t physical, but a physical result was produced through that contact providing precisely that “inspiring, aesthetic, spiritual, deeply moving and meaningful interaction” mentioned as the goal of physical contact.

The main difference between the IETI-listed benefits of such contact and the teachings of The Urantia Book is that scientists are looking to connect extraterrestrial physical beings with some few worthy individuals here when in fact The Urantia Book teaches that every intelligent being is as worthy as any other for spiritual guidance. The extraterrestrial knowledge that has been given is available to anyone with the acumen or desire to accept its gift.

We here on earth may consider ourselves as somewhat isolated, somewhat in the dark, somewhat on our own–some may even feel like we are an orphan planet out here on the fringes of a vast universe–a universe that is being revealed to our wondering eyes on a regular basis through the technology of our space programs. And to purely material eyes this may seem to be the case; but through the gift of revelation, which has been given to us multiple times [The Five Epochal Revelations], and now again in the form of The Urantia Book, we are assured that far from being orphans, we are beloved members of the vast spiritual civilization called the Kingdom of Heaven. When Jesus walked the earth he told his followers it was at hand; even now, the benefits and privileges of the spiritual domain are available to any who seek them. The Urantia Book revelation makes the way plain, and helps us get to know some of the off-planet players who have made this revelation possible and who continue to fellowship us–now, and into eternity.

What Does The Urantia Book Teach?

About Extraterrestrial Life:

A most intriguing chapter of The Urantia Book is titled “Government on a Neighboring Planet” in which the social and cultural aspects of a planet of material beings like us are described. However, the meeting of such material beings, even those from neighboring planets, is highly unlikely.

The Urantia Book was indicted by spirit beings who can and do make contact with material worlds. For that reason we will concentrate the answers to the IETI questions upon the spirit beings and personalities who have made contact with us. However, not all beings who visit us are spiritual; some have been decidedly material: for example Adam and Eve, Melchizedek, and Michael of Nebadon [aka Jesus of Nazareth]. While one may not automatically think of these beings as ETs, they truly are not of this world, with the notable and unique exception of Jesus, who is both a true human being and a Divine spiritual Son of God!

About order and stability in the universe:

There is stability [God upholds all things] in the midst of apparent instability. There is an underlying order and security in the midst of the energy upheavals and the physical cataclysms of the starry realms.

The bestowal of life renders material-energy systems capable of self-perpetuation, self-propagation, and self-adaptation.

Life is constructed according to plans [Life does not originate spontaneously...] and appears on the inhabited planets either by direct importation or as a result of the operations of the Life Carriers of the local universes.

The foundation of the universe is material, but the essence of life is spirit. The Father of spirits is also the ancestor of universes… The Urantia Book, (42:1.1)

Specific teachings relating to the questions that IETI have posed are addressed in The Urantia Book in the following manner. While this is not an exhaustive display of all possible replies to the questions posed, the following quotes will give the reader a starting place; click on the links to read the supporting paragraphs:

Q2. Tell us about the ET culture; the grand sweep of their history and cultural evolution;

There are permanent residents of planet earth, some of whom have been here for hundreds of thousands of years; they do not die. Although existing just outside the range of the human senses, they can occasionally make themselves visible to humans. They are called midway creatures. It was under their direction that the text of The Urantia Book was produced.

Midwayers are numbered, rather than named; the midway culture is stable and purposeful; their record-keeping and memory preserve important events in earth’s history. It is they who recorded the life of Jesus intact, as it happened.

A high order of spirit beings capable of becoming physical are the Melchizedeks, divine Sons of God; friendly and wise intermediaries between the spiritual and material worlds.

Vorondadeks [Every quarantined or isolated world has a Vorondadek...] are an order of spirit beings who “rule in the kingdoms of men.” On our world, torn by rebellion, a Vorondadek Son has been on duty for several hundreds of thousands of years.

• their greatest achievements, struggles, and mistakes;

In the hierarchy of spirit beings, the Melchizedeks are well-nigh perfect in wisdom, but they are not always infallible in judgment.Mighty Messengers are a class of perfected mortals who have proven to be loyal to universe governance in the face of rebellion.Most spirit beings progress from lower stages of existence. And in the contemplation of their long existence, spirit beings enjoy humor as a way of keeping a healthy perspective.Those Without Name and Number are spirit beings comprehending the eternal purpose of God in a way that transcends the ability of mortal beings. They are named [like us].
The highest orders of spirit beings engaged in revealing truth to the planets are Perfectors of Wisdom, Divine Counselors, and Universal Censors.Seraphic voices of the Garden of Eden are angelic helpers who were of invaluable aid to Adam and Eve. To humans angels are invisible spirit beings.A Midwayer speaks [Acknowledgment...]: How and why the revelation of the life and teachings of Jesus was given to the people of earth.

• their major current projects, challenges, dangers, fears, and hopes;

The record of the existence of every human being is carefully kept by spirit beings, personality record keepers [The Worlds of the Archangels...] These records span even the eternal career.Most spirit beings are as challenged to see us, as we are to see them.Thought Adjusters are a special kind of spirit that dwell within every human mind–they are an actual FRAGMENT OF God himself–a “spark” of infinity. During a lifetime, they create a potentially immortal spirit counterpart of each person...all worthwhile attributes are preserved.

Spirit beings pass through ordinary matter, which they perceive as unreal.
Gravitational forces used for transit to overcome the handicaps of great stretches of time and unimaginable distances.Velocities attainable by spirit beings:

There are 1,111 loyal secondary midwayers engaged in important missions on earth... they have certain definite powers over material things, time and space, not excepting the beasts of the realm.
“In observing a transport seraphim being made ready to receive a passenger for interplanetary transit, there may be seen what are apparently “double sets of wings extending from the head to the foot of the angel. In reality these wings are energy insulators–friction shields.”
While some spirit beings are able to visit the material worlds, they live on constructed architectural spheres.

Those High in Authority are spirit administrators without limitation. They are the everywhere-present and always-efficient executives of the Ancients of Days. They serve on any sphere, on any inhabited world, and in any phase of activity in any of the seven superuniverses.Those High in Authority present the cause of justice in behalf of our errors of judgment

Q4. What should be done to achieve contact with extraterrestrial intelligence?

An extraterrestrial connection of the highest order is within each one of us. It’s up to us to recognize the connection and to accept the fact that it exists.
There lives within each of us a fragment of infinity.
Worship experience in Divine communication is realized on four levels: the intellectual, the morontial, the spiritual, and the personal.

• Does any dangerous or hostile form of ETI pose any threat to us?

The universe is friendly to every child of the eternal God.
The true meaning and practice of the Golden Rule fills believers with an “assurance of a friendly universe.”
Said Jesus: “I do not believe that real harm can befall me.”
While the spirit administration is friendly, material beings on other worlds could possibly be belligerent, which is further reason why it’s very rare for physical beings from one world to interact with beings on another–the superior culture would always dominate the inferior.

Q5. Toward what long-term future or ultimate destination is the universe heading?

Q10. What additional knowledge about us would they like? What baffles or puzzles them about us?

Answered by a Solitary Messenger, who wonders why we are not more engaged with our divine indweller, whose only function is to strengthen and cheer us through our earthly life.

The Urantia Book Further Teaches:

• The universe is neither mechanical nor magical; it is a creation of mind and a mechanism of law.
• Spirit beings and their physical counterparts have visited, and continue to visit, earth. The realm of spirit, the nonphysical aspect of creation, oversees, administers, and guides all physical manifestations from atomic particles to galaxies, from inorganic material to living beings, and from space and time to infinity and eternity. Spirit beings are responsible for the overcontrol of the physical universe; they initiate and guide the creation of planets, stars, star systems, and galaxies, the purpose of which is to provide incubators for the evolution of life. We may not readily see definite origins, but we certainly can see the orderliness and predictability of the material universe. From this, we can easily deduce both a physical and a spiritual “minded” creation.
• Life is not an accidental chemical reaction; it is designed and planned by beings whose purpose is to be the designers and implementers of life for all of creation. The life on any given inhabitable world is designed and created specifically for the conditions of that world. When suitable conditions for life are found on an evolutionary world it is implanted as single-celled organisms and allowed to evolve naturally over vast spans of time. The cosmos is the nursery for trillions of inhabited planets.
• As Jesus told us, “In my Father’s house are many mansions.” It is intended that material worlds, like earth, evolve naturally, without outside physical contact, without the life of one inhabited world interfering with the life on another. The “many mansions,” worlds inhabited by those who have died on material worlds, are both material and spiritual. Life on material worlds is designed to unfold naturally and without intervention. Despite the trillions of inhabited worlds, physical contact between them is rare. Even though real spiritual growth is possible and desirable on the material worlds such as ours, in a time to come, after we leave this world, we will mingle on the spirit worlds, not on these physical ones.

About itself, The Urantia Book has this to say:

These papers, of which this is one, constitute the most recent presentation of truth to the mortals of Urantia. These papers differ from all previous revelations, for they are not the work of a single universe personality but a composite presentation by many beings. But no revelation short of the attainment of the Universal Father can ever be complete. All other celestial ministrations are no more than partial, transient, and practically adapted to local conditions in time and space. While such admissions as this may possibly detract from the immediate force and authority of all revelations, the time has arrived on Urantia when it is advisable to make such frank statements, even at the risk of weakening the future influence and authority of this, the most recent of the revelations of truth to the mortal races of Urantia.

Credentials of the Revelation:

The Urantia Papers were indicted by ETs in the year 1934, the book consists of four parts containing these Papers. At the conclusion of each PART, the authority for providing it is provided, as follows:

• PART I. The Central and Superuniverses. These thirty-one papers depicting the nature of Deity, the reality of Paradise, the organization and working of the central and superuniverses, the personalities of the grand universe, and the high destiny of evolutionary mortals, were sponsored, formulated, and put into English by a high commission consisting of twenty-four Orvonton administrators acting in accordance with a mandate issued by the Ancients of Days of Uversa directing that we should do this on Urantia, 606 of Satania, in Norlatiadek of Nebadon, in the year A.D. 1934.

• PART II. The Local Universe. Sponsored by a Nebadon Corps of Local Universe Personalities acting by authority of Gabriel of Salvington. These twenty-five papers are a series of presentations by various authors, having been sponsored as a group by a commission of Nebadon personalities numbering twelve and acting under the direction of Mantutia Melchizedek. We indited these narratives and put them in the English language, by a technique authorized by our superiors, in the year 1934 of Urantia time.

• PART III. The History of Urantia. Sponsored by a Corps of Local Universe Personalities acting by authority of Gabriel of Salvington, narrates the history of Urantia down to the time of Michael’s appearance on earth in the likeness of mortal flesh. These sixty-three papers were authorized by a Nebadon commission of twelve acting under the direction of Mantutia Melchizedek. We indited these narratives and put them in the English language, by a technique authorized by our superiors, in the year A.D. 1935 of Urantia time.

NOTE: At the end of each of the first 119 Papers, the authors provide statements about themselves. See the list of authors above.

Additional Authorization Caveats:

• Indited by an Orvonton Divine Counselor, Chief of the Corps of Superuniverse Personalities assigned to portray on Urantia the truth concerning the Paradise Deities and the universe of universes.

• Presented by a Divine Counselor, a member of a group of celestial personalities assigned by the Ancients of Days on Uversa, the headquarters of the seventh superuniverse, to supervise those portions of this forthcoming revelation which have to do with affairs beyond the borders of the local universe of Nebadon. I am commissioned to sponsor those papers portraying the nature and attributes of God because I represent the highest source of information available for such a purpose on any inhabited world. I have served as a Divine Counselor in all seven of the superuniverses and have long resided at the Paradise center of all things. Many times have I enjoyed the supreme pleasure of a sojourn in the immediate personal presence of the UniversalFather. I portray the reality and truth of the Father’s nature and attributes with unchallengeable authority; I know whereof I speak.

The above are fundamentals of The Urantia Book relating to extraterrestrial contact.

Having scrutinized the content of the book in-depth we believe it meets all the criteria established for contact with extraterrestrial intelligence. Scientifically minded, logical and critical thinkers’ first inclination may be to scoff and think this is another of those mind tricks we humans continuously play on themselves—that this relates to channeled material or some other kind of subconscious human mind upwellings. We are fully aware of channeled material, psychic manifestations and the workings of the subconscious mind; The Urantia Book is none of those. Will scientifically minded, logical thinkers be willing to dismiss this possibility without in-depth scrutiny for themselves?

In spite of The Urantia Book originating from extraterrestrial sources its contents provide the answers to mankind’s most challenging and foremost questions; it has the power to transform individuals, communities, nations, and the planet.

Please determine for yourselves whether, as we believe, the sought after contact hasn’t already occurred. We recommend that you read The Urantia Book.

Mon, December 19, 2016

Re-Imagining Jesus - Remastered!

By TruthBook Staff

Re-Imagining Jesus is a feature length film based on the matchless story of Jesus' ministry in The Urantia Book. The film is accompanied by an original and lovely musical score composed by critically acclaimed composer and Urantia Book reader, Gary Deinstadt. And it is narrated by David Kantor, by Jennifer Siegel, and by Stephen Zendt.

Now, in this Christmas season of 2016, we are happy to announce that Re-Imagining Jesus has been remastered (complete with closed-captions) and is better than ever!

David spent five years in the production of this superb film. Much of it is filmed in the very places where Jesus lived and launched his momentous preaching missions, and the footage of many of the important places in the master's ministry, such as the Jordan River and Mt Hermon, are beautiful, even today. Archaeology plays a part in the discovery of Jesus' missions, giving the viewer a fuller understanding of life in Jesus' times.

Modern seekers of Jesus are thirsty for more of Jesus than has been available for 20 centuries. Re-Imagining Jesus is meant to engage any and all followers of the Master, and it is hoped that this new view of Jesus will open meaningful discussion among all those who seek a deeper understanding, and a closer walk, with Jesus.

Highlights of the film include:

The classic New Testament story illuminated with detail from The Urantia Book's biography of Jesus

Beautiful footage of seldom seen places associated with some of the most important events in the Master's life

Detailed maps providing important geographic orientation

Timeline of events between the baptism in the Jordan and the resurrection

A compelling story about his primary mission -- the revelation of a spiritual kingdom accessible here and now

Closed-captioning

We encourage you to set aside some time during this Christmas season; maybe plan a family movie night, or even a neighborhood movie night, and make it an occasion to share with your family, friends, church associates or neighbors.

From The Urantia Book:

196:1.2 The time is ripe to witness the figurative resurrection of the human Jesus from his burial tomb amidst the theological traditions and the religious dogmas of nineteen centuries. Jesus of Nazareth must not be longer sacrificed to even the splendid concept of the glorified Christ. What a transcendent service if, through this revelation, the Son of Man should be recovered from the tomb of traditional theology and be presented as the living Jesus to the church that bears his name, and to all other religions!

Thu, December 15, 2016

Is Planetary Evolution Purposeful?

By TruthBook Staff

Here's a great article found in the popular press: Can Evolution Have a 'Higher Purpose'? by Robert Wright

Urantia Book readers will definitely be able to answer this question with a resounding YES! Evolution not only CAN, but it DOES have a higher purpose! See our blog below where we will explore this idea according to Urantia Book teachings, but here are some snippets from this interesting article. The author found the very idea "weird," and was very surprised that a distinguished scientist (William D Hamilton) could entertain such an idea:

"During the interview, I was trying to steer Hamilton toward philosophical topics, and at one point he went further than I had expected. He said, 'I'm also quite open to the view that there is some kind of ultimate good which is of a religious nature — that we just have to look beyond what the evolutionary theory tells us and accept promptings of what ultimate good is, coming from some other source.' That's an unusual thing for a great evolutionary biologist to say, but the most unusual part was still to come.

"[Hamilton continues:] He answered: 'Yes, yes. There's one theory of the universe that I rather like — I accept it in an almost joking spirit — and that is that Planet Earth in our solar system is a kind of zoo for extraterrestrial beings who dwell out there somewhere. And this is the best, the most interesting experiment they could set up: to set up the evolution on Planet Earth going in such a way that it would produce these really interesting characters — humans who go around doing things — and they watch their experiment, interfering hardly at all so that almost everything we do comes out according to the laws of nature. But every now and then they see something which doesn't look quite right — this zoo is going to kill itself off if they let you do this or that.' So, he continued, these extraterrestrials 'insert a finger and just change some little thing. And maybe those are the miracles which the religious people like to so emphasize.' He reiterated: 'I put it forward in an almost joking spirit. But I think it's a kind of hypothesis that's very, very hard to dismiss.' "

This is a good article and I recommend it for anyone who wants to see what modern science is saying regarding evolution and its purposes.

What Does The Urantia Book Teach About Evolution?

In some ways, the scenario described above about the extraterrestrials who inaugurate life on planets and then watch as it evolves is pretty close to what we are taught in The Urantia Book. But instead of some "spooky" mad scientists, the beings who first introduced life on our planet are called, appropriately enough, "Life Carriers." They do not interfere once the process is started, but in other respects, the hypothesis in the article is pretty spot-on.

A Life Carrier speaks:

58:4.1 That we are called Life Carriers should not confuse you. We can and do carry life to the planets, but we brought no life to Urantia. Urantia life is unique, original with the planet. This sphere is a life-modification world; all life appearing hereon was formulated by us right here on the planet; and there is no other world in all Satania, even in all Nebadon, that has a life existence just like that of Urantia.

600,000,000 years ago the commission of Life Carriers sent out from Jerusem arrived on Urantia and began the study of physical conditions preparatory to launching life on world number 606 of the Satania system. This was to be our six hundred and sixth experience with the initiation of the Nebadon life patterns in Satania and our sixtieth opportunity to make changes and institute modifications in the basic and standard life designs of the local universe.

The Satania Life Carriers had projected a sodium chloride pattern of life; therefore no steps could be taken toward planting it until the ocean waters had become sufficiently briny. The Urantia type of protoplasm can function only in a suitable salt solution. All ancestral life—vegetable and animal—evolved in a salt-solution habitat. And even the more highly organized land animals could not continue to live did not this same essential salt solution circulate throughout their bodies in the blood stream which freely bathes, literally submerses, every tiny living cell in this "briny deep."

Your primitive ancestors freely circulated about in the salty ocean; today, this same oceanlike salty solution freely circulates about in your bodies, bathing each individual cell with a chemical liquid in all essentials comparable to the salt water which stimulated the first protoplasmic reactions of the first living cells to function on the planet.

But as this era opens, Urantia is in every way evolving toward a state favorable for the support of the initial forms of marine life. Slowly but surely physical developments on earth and in adjacent space regions are preparing the stage for the later attempts to establish such life forms as we had decided would be best adapted to the unfolding physical environment—both terrestrial and spatial.

550,000,000 years ago the Life Carrier corps returned to Urantia. In co-operation with spiritual powers and superphysical forces we organized and initiated the original life patterns of this world and planted them in the hospitable waters of the realm. All planetary life ... had its origin in our three original, identical, and simultaneous marine-life implantations. These three life implantations have been designated as: the central or Eurasian-African, the eastern or Australasian, and the western, embracing Greenland and the Americas.

500,000,000 years ago primitive marine vegetable life was well established on Urantia. Greenland and the arctic land mass, together with North and South America, were beginning their long and slow westward drift. Africa moved slightly south, creating an east and west trough, the Mediterranean basin, between itself and the mother body. Antarctica, Australia, and the land indicated by the islands of the Pacific broke away on the south and east and have drifted far away since that day.

Again, from a Life Carrier:

65:1.7 After the life patterns have been formulated and the material organizations have been duly completed, the supermaterial forces concerned in life propagation become forthwith active, and life is existent. Whereupon the Life Carriers are immediately returned to their normal mid-phase of personality existence, in which estate they can manipulate the living units and maneuver the evolving organisms, even though they are shorn of all ability to organize—create—new patterns of living matter.

After organic evolution has run a certain course and free will of the human type has appeared in the highest evolving organisms, the Life Carriers must either leave the planet or take renunciation vows; that is, they must pledge themselves to refrain from all attempts further to influence the course of organic evolution. And when such vows are voluntarily taken by those Life Carriers who choose to remain on the planet as future advisers to those who shall be intrusted with the fostering of the newly evolved will creatures, there is summoned a commission of twelve, presided over by the chief of the Evening Stars, acting by authority of the System Sovereign and with permission of Gabriel; and forthwith these Life Carriers are transmuted to the third phase of personality existence—the semispiritual level of being. And I have functioned on Urantia in this third phase of existence ever since the times of Andon and Fonta.

65:2.1 The story of man's ascent from seaweed to the lordship of earthly creation is indeed a romance of biologic struggle and mind survival. Man's primordial ancestors were literally the slime and ooze of the ocean bed in the sluggish and warm-water bays and lagoons of the vast shore lines of the ancient inland seas, those very waters in which the Life Carriers established the three independent life implantations on Urantia.

65:3.7 And in discussing the fostering of evolution, it would not be amiss to point out that, in the long future ahead, when you may sometime be attached to a corps of Life Carriers, you will have abundant and ample opportunity to offer suggestions and make any possible improvements in the plans and technique of life management and transplantation. Be patient! If you have good ideas, if your minds are fertile with better methods of administration for any part of the universal domains, you are certainly going to have an opportunity to present them to your associates and fellow administrators in the ages to come.

We are a "Life-Experiment World"

65:4.1 Do not overlook the fact that Urantia was assigned to us as a life-experiment world. On this planet we made our sixtieth attempt to modify and, if possible, improve the Satania adaptation of the Nebadon life designs, and it is of record that we achieved numerous beneficial modifications of the standard life patterns. To be specific, on Urantia we worked out and have satisfactorily demonstrated not less than twenty-eight features of life modification which will be of service to all Nebadon throughout all future time.

But the establishment of life on no world is ever experimental in the sense that something untried and unknown is attempted. The evolution of life is a technique ever progressive, differential, and variable, but never haphazard, uncontrolled, nor wholly experimental, in the accidental sense.

Many features of human life afford abundant evidence that the phenomenon of mortal existence was intelligently planned, that organic evolution is not a mere cosmic accident. When a living cell is injured, it possesses the ability to elaborate certain chemical substances which are empowered so to stimulate and activate the neighboring normal cells that they immediately begin the secretion of certain substances which facilitate healing processes in the wound; and at the same time these normal and uninjured cells begin to proliferate—they actually start to work creating new cells to replace any fellow cells which may have been destroyed by the accident.

What's the Purpose?

Evolution is tempered and influenced by the presence of mind and its associated growth in any living organism; evolution eventally produces beings who are capable of intuition, understanding, bravery, knowledge, social living, and lastly, of wisdom and of worship. All living beings possess one or more of these attributes, but the last two of these attributes of evolved beings separate man from a mere animal. The ability to recognize something higher than himself distinguishes man as the crown of creation. Man's ability to develop wisdom through learning is also part of man's unique accomplishment and again, is a hallmark of humanity that is not shared by any other animal-origin being.

Beings who are thus equipped to live in a material world and at the same time recognize the source of their very existence ARE the crown of creation; it is these beings, being like you and me, who are destined to gain eternal life and proceed higher and higher in the cosmos until once more being united with that Source. And that Source we call God.

There is little about evolution that is random or haphazard. The universe is a mechanism of mind and creation governed by law.

65:5.3 The universe of universes, including this small world called Urantia, is not being managed merely to meet our approval nor just to suit our convenience, much less to gratify our whims and satisfy our curiosity. The wise and all-powerful beings who are responsible for universe management undoubtedly know exactly what they are about; and so it becomes Life Carriers and behooves mortal minds to enlist in patient waiting and hearty co-operation with the rule of wisdom, the reign of power, and the march of progress.

The celestial supervisors of this planet express complete confidence in the ultimate evolutionary triumph of the human race and in the eventual vindication of our original plans and life patterns.

Evolution is God's infinite creation in finite time and space

65:8.3 The individual's yardstick for time measurement is the length of his life. All creatures are thus time conditioned, and therefore do they regard evolution as being a long-drawn-out process. To those of us whose life span is not limited by a temporal existence, evolution does not seem to be such a protracted transaction. On Paradise, where time is nonexistent, these things are all present in the mind of Infinity and the acts of Eternity.

As mind evolution is dependent on, and delayed by, the slow development of physical conditions, so is spiritual progress dependent on mental expansion and unfailingly delayed by intellectual retardation. But this does not mean that spiritual evolution is dependent on education, culture, or wisdom. The soul may evolve regardless of mental culture but not in the absence of mental capacity and desire—the choice of survival and the decision to achieve ever-increasing perfection—to do the will of the Father in heaven. Although survival may not depend on the possession of knowledge and wisdom, progression most certainly does.

In the cosmic evolutionary laboratories mind is always dominant over matter, and spirit is ever correlated with mind. Failure of these diverse endowments to synchronize and co-ordinate may cause time delays, but if the individual really knows God and desires to find him and become like him, then survival is assured regardless of the handicaps of time. Physical status may handicap mind, and mental perversity may delay spiritual attainment, but none of these obstacles can defeat the whole-souled choice of will.

When physical conditions are ripe, sudden mental evolutions may take place; when mind status is propitious, sudden spiritual transformations may occur; when spiritual values receive proper recognition, then cosmic meanings become discernible, and increasingly the personality is released from the handicaps of time and delivered from the limitations of space.

Please visit the following papers and studies to learn much more about evolution in The Urantia Book:

Wed, December 14, 2016

As Seen on TV: The Explosion of the Sun and the Annihilation of Life

By TruthBook Staff

At present there are a number of long running television series entertaining the idea that earth will eventually be destroyed when the fuel of the sun is exhausted, causing it to erupt into a gigantic ball of energy engulfing and crisping all of the planets.

Astronomers and astrophysicists have found evidence of this destruction occurring in other solar systems and project that it will eventually happen here as well. This argument has helped scientists and dreamers to envision human beings traveling in space ships to distant stars so that earth life can continue even if our planet is destroyed. Additionally, there is concern that life on earth could be wiped out before the sun dies due to contact with a comet or asteroid.

What Does The Urania Book Teach?

The intent of this short article is to reduce the confusion of truth seekers by familiarizing them with the teachings of The Urantia Book relating to this subject. The Urantia Book provides plausible explanation to ensure that fear of the unknown and fear of what the future may hold do not contribute adversely to either personal destiny or social development. The Urantia Book provides reasonable teachings regarding expectations for the future, the birth and death of stars, and of human beings. These teachings can be summarized as follows:

• The realm of spirit, the nonphysical aspect of creation, oversees, administers, and guides all physical manifestations from atomic particles to galaxies, from inorganic material to living beings, and from space and time to infinity and eternity. We may not readily see definite origins, but we certainly can see the orderliness and predictability of the material universe. From this, we can easily deduce a "minded" creation. From The Urantia Book:

42:0.2 The manipulation of universe energy [matter] is ever in accordance with the personal will and the all-wise mandates of the Universal Father ... all force-energy is under the ultimate control of a personal God resident at the center of all things.

42:11.1 The universe is neither mechanical nor magical; it is a creation of mind and a mechanism of law.

42:11.6 Extremely complex and highly automatic-appearing cosmic mechanisms always tend to conceal the presence of the originative or creative indwelling mind from any and all intelligences very far below the universe levels of the nature and capacity of the mechanism itself. Therefore is it inevitable that the higher universe mechanisms must appear to be mindless to the lower orders of creatures. The only possible exception to such a conclusion would be the implication of mindedness in the amazing phenomenon of an apparently self-maintaining universe ...

• Spirit beings, responsible for the overcontrol of the physical universe, initiate and guide the creation of planets, stars, star systems, and galaxies, the purpose of which is to provide incubators for the evolution of life.

• Stars, like our sun, go through evolutionary processes. They are born of space materials and energies, become mature, and many eventually die to become gigantic cold bodies. It's this dying at some far future time that concerns scientists about the destiny of our sun. But we have this assurance from the teachings of The Urantia Book:

41:9.5 Your own sun has long since attained relative equilibrium between its expansion and contraction cycles, those disturbances which produce the gigantic pulsations of many of the younger stars. Your sun is now passing out of its six billionth year. At the present time it is functioning through the period of greatest economy. It will shine on as of present efficiency for more than twenty-five billion years. It will probably experience a partially efficient period of decline as long as the combined periods of its youth and stabilized function.

• Life is not an accidental chemical reaction; it is designed and planned by beings whose purpose is to be the designers and implementers of life for all of creation. The life on any given inhabitable world is designed and created specifically for the conditions of that world. When suitable conditions for life are found on an evolutionary world it is implanted as single-celled organisms and allowed to evolve naturally over vast spans of time. The cosmos is the nursery for trillions of inhabited planets.

• There is in the mind of God a purpose for the cosmos, one aspect being that it is the developmental testing ground for life in all its manifestations. Human beings are the apex of physical life, having the capability of making free will choices and decisions, evolving eventually to become perfected beings. And as regards the potential and destiny of any and all individuals, that destiny is sure. That potential is automatic, and nothing and no one can influence the desire of any person to achieve eternal life.

The above are fundamental teachings of The Urantia Book as they relate to the hand of God reaching down into the affairs of men.

Earth's Destiny

On a planetary level the sun will not explode, asteroids or comets will not impact the earth. The destruction astronomers witness is occurring in uninhabited star systems and is not a blueprint for the destruction of our sun or planet. Life is sacred, tailored for each individual planet; that tailoring, nurturing, and long evolutionary road are valuable; this experience is guarded and not subject to arbitrary obliteration.

We can even gain reassurance about the future from observing the orderliness of the cosmos, as well as the largely unseen life that we live...an order that can be appreciated by human mind, suggesting that such fundamental order is itself, a mechanism of mind.

42:7.1 The formation of all matter is on the order of the solar system. There is at the center of every minute universe of energy a relatively stable, comparatively stationary, nuclear portion of material existence. This central unit is endowed with a threefold possibility of manifestation. Surrounding this energy center there whirl, in endless profusion but in fluctuating circuits, the energy units which are faintly comparable to the planets encircling the sun of some starry group like your own solar system.

The destiny of a world such as ours is realized through trial and tribulation, advancement and decline; eventually human beings as a species will improve mentally and spiritually to where we recognize that life has real purpose, that we are children of a loving God, that all people are our brothers and sisters, and that we are intended to be good stewards of the life on this world. In The Urantia Book this is known as the era of light and life, the destiny for all inhabited worlds. This is an age in which the Kingdom of Heaven will have been established on the earth; physical existence will be glorious from that time forward.

If material creation were left to run its own course, if there were no spiritual overcontrol, then both inhabited and uninhabitable stars and planets would follow the normal evolutionary course of birth, maturity, decay and destruction. Such is not the case: suns with inhabited worlds are fully stabilized when light and life is achieved. They continue on into eternity.

As for establishing earth life on distant worlds, this one particular planet is our only true home. No other planet will substitute, life here is designed for this world. Attempting to live anywhere else will never be natural. Even on planets that may outwardly seem to be duplicates of earth the microorganisms will vary enough to prohibit a natural life without life support to substitute for earth life.

While unlikely, there is a scenario put forth in The Urantia Book that describes a situation in which, for some reason, our earth becomes uninhabitable at some point. Again, the teachings of The Urantia Book assure us that once life is begun on a world such as ours, it cannot be extinguished. Whether it is brought to perfection here, or elsewhere, it WILL be allowed to continue, even though conditions for its continuance would likely be difficult:

51:2.3 If some physical catastrophe should doom the planetary residence of an evolving race, the Melchizedeks and the Life Carriers would install the technique of dematerialization for all survivors, and by seraphic transport these beings would be carried away to the new world prepared for their continuing existence. The evolution of a human race, once initiated on a world of space, must proceed quite independently of the physical survival of that planet.

Comfort for the Fearful

But what does it matter if all things earthly crash even during our lifetime? During his short life on earth, Jesus gave us assurance that this life is but a bridge to a better one and he demonstrated it first by teaching and then by actually healing the sick, healing people who were sick and thought to be dead, bringing back to life people who were dead, and letting it be known that he would personally rise from the dead, which he did.

Jesus' teachings and examples should bring comfort to believers and dispel fear for what the unforeseen future might bring. And it should not be forgotten that our world, our Urantia, is known as the "sentimental shrine" of the universe because out of all the planets in his universe that he could have chosen, Jesus chose this planet as the place for his incarnation as the Babe of Bethlehem. This can also help the fearful to be assured that Jesus will never forsake us.

It's the spirit component to existence that makes all the difference, that sense of belonging to an ordered and logical creation that can dispel fear. LIFE is the purpose and LIFE will always continue.